Marisa Kirisame
Skills Marisa is a high-level magician, technically powerful enough to employ literally any sort of magic native to her own world. But despite this, she's highly specialized, focusing on heat, light, energy, and fire magic to the point that it makes up a good eighty percent of her repertoire. In combat, her primary weapon is danmaku - elaborate, dense curtains of hundreds to thousands of non-lethal concussive energy bullets shot in all directions at once, forcing the opponent to prioritize dodging over retaliating. Danmaku is a game, and just like everyone else from her world, Marisa is sporting about it; despite her attacks often (read: usually) being overwhelming/ridiculous/terrifying, there's always a way to go through them unscratched if you use your intellect to figure out and anticipate the patterns. She's a big fan of lasers, especially giant ones - her lasers range from the foot-tall Narrow Spark to her signature Master Spark, an absurdly large weapon that brings blistering heat, earth tremors, blinding light, and lots of pain in it's wake. Her philosophy is that power conquers all, and this is very clear in her signature spells; almost everything she does is huge, flashy, and over-the-top destructive, even when there's no logical reason for it to be. Even after having her power cut after being pulled into Pandora (she can't incinerate a mountain anymore, and her danmaku has a shorter lifespan than it used to), she's still a force to be reckoned with. Going all-out berserk with power, intimidating as it may be, isn't the smartest strategy. Marisa is prone to wearing herself out prematurely by insisting on spamming overly-large and complicated spells when it's unnecessary, and with some brains it's not hard to overcome her brawn. The size of her spells also makes them slow and easy to predict. When it comes to the dozens of other applications of magic Marisa's dabbled in, she's much less impressive, as she only has basic spells memorized. This gives her tiny talents such as vaguely predicting the future, flight, tracking, light healing, shields, charging weapons, and other such assorted things. But if she were to find a spell-book containing more complicated spells and rituals, she would almost certainly be able to cast them, so long as it runs off the system of magic she's familiar with. But for the most part, she's over-specialized to the point of backing herself into a corner; unlike most magicians, who can use a variety of magics to succeed in a variety of situations, Marisa's only really good for explosions and combat, and won't do well if tasked with anything else. As a normal human, Marisa does not have the innate potential necessary to use the level of power she does. To overcome her handicap, she uses her Hakkero, a palm-sized magical furnace. If she were to lose it, her firepower would essentially be cut in third. Marisa is always accompanied by her enchanted broom, which can fly, shoot bullets and missiles, conduct magic, and disappear and reappear as she wishes. Marisa is athletic, and in good physical shape. While still within the limits of an ordinary human, she's light on her feet and speedy, and can take a considerable amount of damage before she starts to show signs of hurt. She's good-but-not-great at close-range combat, both barehanded and using her broom as a staff. (It helps that she enchants her broom to cause more damage than it should - she hits like someone twice her size!) Marisa's mental facilities are, for the most part, more of a weakness than a strength. She has the equivalent of a fourth-grade education, and brashly rushes into dangerous situations without thinking. As far as she's concerned, brains are useless. However, she's smarter than she seems. It's just that, most of the time, she's too busy bouncing off the walls to calm down and think, which is why she acts like such a dumb brute. She's oddly gifted at math - she can do complex calculations in her head, and has several hundred digits of pi memorized just because. Marisa's shown a slight resistance to mental tampering, such as lunar-induced insanity. It's not usually enough to resist entirely, but it is enough that such things affect her less than the average person, and the person trying to get in her head will have to try harder than usual to do it. Marisa claims that this is because she's crazy, but it's more likely due to strong willpower. She's also a surprisingly eloquent writer. Personality Marisa is a loud, boisterous, profoundly selfish bundle of playful energy. If the world is a stage, she fancies herself the star, and wants all the attention and glory that comes attached. She's extremely curious, and since she isn't big on the concept of boundaries, she has no problem sticking her nose into the problems, business, and personal lives of anyone hapless enough to cross her path. Marisa doesn't like to take no for an answer – greed is her signature vice, and so she's more than willing to take what she wants and steamroll anything (or anyone!) in her way. This doesn't just apply to material goods – things like knowledge, adventures, spotlight, and even specific desired relationships are perfectly feasible targets for Marisa's constant lust for more of everything. When it comes to other people, Marisa is somewhat fickle – she's too self-centered to register or truly understand the desires or feelings or others, and so she tramples all over them, instead paying attention to what she wants. When she wants people to be nice to her, or has grown to actually care about her present company, she's a charismatic (if overbearing) rascal with infectious energy and a thousand-watt smile. When she doesn't care, or actively wants conflict, she's a brute, a bully, and frankly kind of a bitch. Marisa enjoys antagonizing others a bit more than she should, and conflict, be it physical or verbal, thrills her to her core. In other words, it's not common for her to go out of her way to rile people up and pick at them so they'll lash out. But no matter how ridiculous Marisa gets, it's never born of legitimate maliciousness. It's just that she's too focused on her own desires to notice just how much she hurts those around her. (In fact, when she does harbor actual ill will towards someone, she's more likely to sulk quietly and avoid interacting with them.) Despite her rough edges, Marisa isn't necessarily a bad person. There's a more heroic side to Marisa, which always comes through in the end. At first glance, her more altruistic side is just as greed-centric as the rest of her; her good deeds are primarily motivated by loot, power, and the convenient excuse to beat people up without consequence. But deep down, she enjoys the warm fuzzies that come from being needed and helping the helpless. She knows what it's like to be powerless, downtrodden, or faced with foes that seem impossible to overcome, and so she secretly harbors quite a bit of sympathy for the underdog, especially when they're human like her. Marisa keeps the deepest part of her personality well-hidden, in a bid to protect her image and avoid receiving unwanted pity. To understand her, it's important to remember that she is a lone normal squishy human from a world full of gods, youkai, demons, and other beings with unimaginable power. She's always had to fight tirelessly to achieve what others are born with. Nothing in her life has been easy or free. Her work ethic is strict and unbreakable. When it comes time to study or train, Marisa's personality almost inverts, becoming serious, reserved, and intolerant of nonsense. She does harbor more than a little resentment towards people with "natural talent" or real "powers," but rather than dwell on it, she's resolved to overcome her disadvantage, and wholeheartedly believes that someday she will be the most powerful magician alive. As a side note, Marisa has an abrasive and thuggish speaking style. The most notable part of this is that she tends to end particurally assertive sentences with the informal masculine nonsense particle “ze.” It's a verbal tic, and she doesn't conciously notice she's doing it unless it's pointed out to her, even though she's aware it's there...meaning it doesn't bother her at all ~ze. Appearance Marisa is a petite Japanese teenager with a boyish build who stands at (an estimated) 5'2. Her eyes are naturally deep red, but she enchants them to shift colors. Usually, she makes them shining metallic gold, but deep blue is fairly common as well. Likewise, her hair is actually bright vermilion, but appears honey-blonde due to aesthetic magic. Her flowing locks of hair fall somewhat haphazardly down to her mid-back, with long bangs covering her forehead. As a signature style, she almost always has a single braid tied on the left side of her head, held together with a pretty bow. Despite being small, Marisa has quite the grand presence - her larger-than-life, supremely confident mannerisms demand constant attention. There's a constant swagger to her step, and she often walks with her arms crossed challengingly. Her face is almost transparent in its expressiveness - she wears her emotions on her sleeve, and her true thoughts are rarely a mystery to anyone nearby. When idle for long periods of time or forced to stand still, Marisa's excess energy makes her unbearably twitchy, forcing her to burn her hyperactivity with constant little repetive motions, such as tapping her foot, groping the air, or messing with her hat. Marisa's clothing draws eyes just as easily as her mannerisms. Marisa is highly image-oriented, and so she always dresses how she imagines a fairytale witch come to life would. She drapes herself in black from head to toe, with the occasional splashes of white or pastel to break up the monotony. She prefers to stick to outfits that are practical on some level - her main concerns here are hiding dirt and maintaining her ability to fight comfortably. However, she still manages to keep herself properly flashy with little bits of flair, such as ribbons, bows, lace, and shiny witchy trinkets.There's a clear Elegant Gothic Lolita influence to her wardrobe. Marisa's signature accessory is her witch's hat: black and absurdly massive, with a brim that goes well past her shoulders, ruffled lace for the interior, and a oft-changed bow tied around it. Incidentally, Marisa is very much a product of her environment, and her sense of style reflects Gensokyo's antiquated norms - you probably won't see her wearing pants any time soon. Relationships History Marisa was born in Gensokyo's human village, as the only child of the owner of the esteemed Kirisame-ya secondhand goods shop. As a child, Marisa felt smothered due to how set-in-stone her destiny was; she was to grow up into an admirable, classy lady, continue the family name, and take on the business. Often, her father would take her to the curiosities shop Kourindou, owned by his old friend Rinnosuke Morichika...and that was a ray of excitement in her dull life. Kourindou often carried amazing objects from the Real World outside Gensokyo, incredible enchanted objects, and goods intended for youkai. To Marisa, this seemed so much more interesting than the boring and mundane world in which she lived. There was so much out there, but so long as she was cooped up in the village, she'd never get to see it. Egged on by this promise of bigger things outside her home, Marisa ran away at the age of ten. Soon after setting out on her own, Marisa was recruited by the evil spirit Mima. Mima viewed herself as the rightful master of the human world, and sought to get vengeance on all of mankind. Something in Marisa intrigued Mima, and they made a deal - Mima would train and care for Marisa in exchange for her service as an underling. Under Mima, Marisa quickly took to astrology-based magic, becoming skilled despite her lack of innate talent. They spent a few years together, practicing magic and terrorizing the general populace, before Reimu Hakurei came along and sealed Mima up, putting a temporary end to her mischief. Mima escaped, and the pair were the masterminds behind a couple schemes to follow, each ending with Reimu beating the snot out of them and locking Mima away. Eventually, Mima just gave up, deciding evil was too much work, and she'd rather waste the days away trolling the fuck out of Reimu. This left Marisa pretty much unemployed. Before, her identity had been entirely based on her role as Mima's underling; without that to rely on, she had to develop an entirely different image and persona for herself. It was a gradual thing - dying her hair and eyes, changing her speech patterns and voice, altering her fashion sense, and even tweaking her attack patterns..but after a few years, Marisa had finally matured into her own person and settled into who she wanted to be. Marisa's had over a dozen grand adventures since, and they've all had the same basic setup - some not-really-evil youkai interferes with the laws of nature, and so Reimu and Marisa both set out to get to the bottom of it. And while Reimu is motivated by annoyance at the youkai's antics, Marisa is motivated every time by curiosity, greed, and lust for power. Nevertheless, despite all she's done and gone through, it's not worth going into detail about - she never develops further as a person, learns any important lessons, or does anything that changes the world. She just discovers an incident, blows up everyone in a hundred mile radius, and then takes all the shinies. Because she's Marisa. Marisa was pulled into Pandora in Spring 126, mere minutes after meeting and defeating Mamizou Futatsuiwa. Pandora History Stuff happened. Music Since Marisa's canon is famous for its soundtrack, there's a lot of arranges of her theme songs floating around. (Working on this still~) 'Main Theme: Love-Coloured Master Spark ' Composer Comments: Marisa's theme. She's the strongest magical girl. I tried to make the song feel like something from an anime, but try as I might, I just couldn't make something that had that heroine feel to it (I'm still practicing), so I tried to make something strong and witchy. I think it feels a little oriental. *Demetori - Love-Coloured Master Spark ~ Final Sorcery *IOSYS - 黒い星 (Black Star) *IOSYS - あたしまりさ (I Am Marisa) *IOSYS - Power of Dream *Silver Forest - Marisa Spark *SOUND HOLIC - HEAT UP MY REVOLUTION *Sonic Hispeed Omega - Shoot Through the Galaxy, Final Master Spark!!! 'Phantasmagoria of Flower View Theme: Oriental Dark Flight ' Composer Comments: The way I first composed this one made Marisa sound like a bad guy, so I added on a bit of playful antiquity to it. In doing so, that antiquity gave it a hint of Middle Eastern flair, which could be a problem. However, given the nature of this game, I'd like to believe this properly reflects the endless stream of action and suspense that happens. * EastNewSound - etching summary * SOUND HOLIC - Laboratory M.P. * SOUND HOLIC - Light Technology 'Immaterial and Missing Power Theme: The Witches' Ball ' Composer Comments: The theme is witches. ...you can't really use "witch girl" with her. It really feels like a bad guy's theme. Well, it's a boss theme, so I guess it is. I wanted it to come through with a feel of intelligence rather than cuteness, but is that how it turned out? 'Scarlet Weather Rhapsody Theme: Vessel of Stars ~ Casket of Star ' Composer Comments: It's hard to make weirder songs than this. The intro has a kind of boss-ish feel to it. It has a bit of a somber feel to it. 'Fairy Wars Theme: Magus Night ' Composer Comments: At first I planned to make it an arrangement of The Witches' Ball. Since I composed it only with the impression left in my mind, it became a completely different song after all... "A song arranged by the original composer can't be an arrangement" may mean this. Anyway, isn't this a cool song? It's no problem if the song is good. *C-CLAYS - Storm *Dark PHOENiX - Magus Night *EastNewSound - Crescent Night *SOUND HOLIC - KIRISAME☆DRIVE *Sugano - Men Becomes a Knight * TAMUSIC - 夜一夜の戰 (One Night's War)